Tag: prayer

A Sunday Morning ConfessionDirect from the Book of Pat

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When I was a kid. I wore hand-me-down shoes a lot of the time until my feet grew bigger than everyone else.
Then I got one pair of shoes.
You’d think as an old man I’d buy more shoes but instead I find that I now just don’t throw old pairs away.
I set them by the door and try using them until one day glue and plastic bags no longer work to hold them together. Then I toss them in the garbage.

There are some days I get in a hurry and forget to take off my good pair.
I feed the chickens and ducks getting muck and gunk caked into the soles and tread. Large sticky mats of hay, feather, and bird poop clumping up usually in the arch and flicking onto the laces.
It’s horrible.

On Sunday morning as I prepare for church I inspect those shoes.
I see how well I did in keeping them clean during the week deciding on just how much effort it’s going to be to wash them clean.
Sometimes I can do it in the bathroom sink where under the bright lights every little speck can be seen clearly. Most times it’s so bad that I have to stand over the kitchen garbage can and scrape off the “shit”. (I tried not to say shit but it is what it is.) Then moving to the kitchen sink I use an old worn toothbrush and wooden toothpick to scrub with detergent and pick out the treads all the filth I managed to pick up through the week. Then when I think I’m satisfied I go to the bathroom, under the bright lights to see the grit and stains left behind.

If you skipped the body of my true story, just reading paragraph speaking points, what I’m saying is this…

All week we/I try very hard to respect the foundations your/my parents taught you/me. To cherish and value what you/I have. To worship God and follow His commandments as best as we/I know how.


Many days, weeks, months I do him honor and keep myself worthy to walk into his house. Yet it takes but one unconscious decision for me to fail for there is no righteous man who walks upon this earth that does not sin.
No matter how often I wash those shoes clean, I’ll get dirt on them as I walk through the churches parking lot.
I’m glad God understands and forgives.

… sometimes I just take my shoes off at the door and go barefoot because I know I am walking upon Holy Ground.

Praise God, Praise His Holy Name!

An Autumn Day

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The heart grows weary as the cold nights lengthen
The wicked gather
Adorned in riches of jewels and gold
Where are the vigilant that tend the watchfires
Have they abandoned their duty to glean the crops
Why have the wise men ceased their understanding
Frequenting instead the alehouse and tavern
Alone the traveler wanders
Burdened by knowledge that the gates have all been barred
Highwaymen prowl like lions
The blind, arrogant, and foolish fall prey
And from the rooftops the innocent crying leap
But there are none to stop their fall

Another Page from the Book of Pat 04/16/24

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It’s the Bureaucrats, the unelected rule makers that secretly and publicly siphon off your life through penalties and taxes.  Like maggots feasting upon your bloated corpse they destroy the healthy flesh just to recreate reality for themselves.

The politicians are just failed individual meat puppets for that machine. The living Ken and Barbie targets for the sheep to worship and hate. Destroy them if you must just never look beyond them into the dark.

It’s when you look beyond that you can see the evil as it truly is. Do you not feel the revulsive gag reflex swelling up and overflowing, as the ooze covered rot seeks to overcome your last defenses of sanity.

Accept the truth. This is the parasite that has eaten into your Constitution and remade sections slowly over time to suit their purpose. It’s time to carve away the blight and cauterize the wound. If you don’t the infection will never heal.

I remember the days before

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I remember the days before pouring through the breach from Saudi Arabia into Iraq.
Months sitting idle standing guard, repairing equipment, training over the same lessons.

The season changed but the looming doubt and fear never did. Each day built upon itself like the ever growing dunes that piled up at the tent flaps.

On occasion some other units would become fully activated and ready. The dynamics of our purpose would change. Tents would be pulled down, moved a few hundred miles, then once again assembled. Each time the burm would not be built up so high or as wide. Each trench dug a little shallower and shorter.

We knew. Soon those protections against the world would only be a hindrance in the final day before the breach.

Live or die, most were ready for what outcome there was to be.
You see, those enlightened few had already experienced death, that blissful adrenaline rush over the edge of reality, and now only moved by muscle memory. We knew what we were to do.

Kill and die, live or die, stand up, move again, rinse, repeat. Everyday was the same day. The only difference was the sand and dirt that piled up at the door.

Soon it will be time for those that don’t know to shake back your own tent flaps. Step out into the reality of an endless day, and fight a war you did not prepare for. Those people will believe in Hell that day…

And us devils who know will be there to show you the way.

On scraps of paper

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That guy holding the gun
That guy isn’t me
That guy sitting alone
Slouching over in the back corner booth
No that guy isn’t me
Licking his lips

Remember the taste
Blackpowder and gun oil
Life going around
Tracing circles at the end of the trap line
Start to finish

Wedding Day

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I’m that great friend who you always feel happy to see. That one you can always depend on to give you his last dollar. The one who listens to your story and helps you remember where you left off in case your mind goes off topic. I remember you and I can tell if you are sick or have something you’re wanting to hide but really need to talk about.

I sincerely care. Prefer giving a compassionate and manly hug. The kind that can be disarming but reassuring. The strength of which has soaked up more snot flowing tears throughout the years than Kleenex and Brawny combined.

I honestly love you for your own weakness and fears. I also am more proud than any parent when I see you conquer those unseen hurdles we all find in life.

You are beautiful. It is the greatest thing in my life to know you. You know I mean it.

I just have one thing that has bothered me. I know it’s bothering you as well because every time we make eye contact you have to guiltily glance away into some awkward place. I see the sides of your cheeks become pulled in as you grind the soft flesh between your teeth. I hear how your breathing pauses and then is released in a low nasal breath. It’s like the scent of the air about you suddenly stagnates.

I suppose it has.

Don’t invite me to a wedding. As much as I love them. I know there are two lists; One is your friends, the other is his or hers. Quite honestly I don’t ever make both. It’s great. I understand. I don’t justify the extra cost of setting a place at the reception. Just don’t lie to yourself and think I didn’t notice the lack of the formal invitation.

We both know when the service was. Get over it.

Just remember that because you didn’t stand up for what you wanted from the beginning chances are your marriage isn’t going to be all peaches and cream.

Your sacrifices are just beginning, and I get to hear all about them.

Insurrection

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War wounds open up again. Flag draped coffins carried out as gently as a baker’s dozen for display.
Strong shoulders bend beneath the reality of their death.
Impudent, impotent old crow in a hurry to pick clean the bones of other kills ruffles his feathers and stares at the sun checking the time.
I would hurl a stone at his head in the hope to do harm but the gore crow smells a meal and wouldn’t let go no matter.
People seem to take pride of their choice. They praise the theft of life as the murder flocks to the feast.
I say string each croaking feather from tall white pillars and let wind and gravity bear witness to the crime.

Old Joe and a Heavy Crown of Thorns

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Just a few more days. If I can hold out for just a few more days then the minutes carrying me up to that moment will be forgotten.
I keep telling myself that. I don’t believe it. I can’t believe it.
I’ve been here before, sat in this very same chair. I’ve watched and witnessed an eternity of failed attempt’s pass by.
Nothing ever changes. Not even the name.

The Traveller sat dumbfounded. How was it he had managed to become lost in such a familiar world. The directions and landmarks had been worn like an old cow trail into his brain. Yet for some reason he had managed to make a misstep. The Traveller had become lost.
Standing in one place and waiting for a rescue was not an option. Panic wasn’t an option either but it was going to be.

“What the fuck…”

Pat sat disinterested in the menu before him. The choices were many but the flavors they offered bland. The same old thing with the the same old spices.
Pat was sick of the choices. Pat was ready to go somewhere new even if new was some greasy meal wagon in the slum side of town.

“Change would be worth a case of the shit’s’.

The Sage sat tensely in his seat. His body rigid, head bowed, forehead covered in sweat. On occasion the old scholar would let out a low groan, then catching himself making the noise, he would shift uneasily in his seat and clench his hands in pain.
Before him sat a book opened to a grotesque drawing of the large intestine. A bookmark dutifully protecting his place.

From one of the dark and disembodied corners of the room a familiar voice was muttering.

“You get what you pay for. Change sucks dick.”

An Anchor in the Deep, The Book of Pat

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I have been here always. Knelt before the same wooden altar. Bathed my mind beneath the ever shifting light of stained glass. I have read and pondered the stories that remain framed within those panels of glass.

They are glittering jewels that dazzle the eyes. Drawing the mind into the inner light that radiates out filling the void of the room beyond.
Marble floor with the patterned grain of darkened stone tracing out it’s ancient markings from time long lost beneath the sea.
Here in quiet remembrance the candles burn, and none but I know why.

The Watcher sat just beyond the doors of the great hall.
The large metal rings which had been fastened as the doorhandles and knocker lay flaccid against the ancient wood.
Their immense diameter and thickness making anyone’s hand look childishly small.
No one as far as the Watcher knew had ever tried the rings to gain entrance to the rooms beyond.
He had though witnessed the rare occasions when those within had swung open one of the doors to come out.
Usually they emerged suddenly and in silence. The great doors hinges effortlessly giving way, and then with little effort reversing back to the closed position. It was during those random moments the Watcher was able to see the doors construction. Thick as a man’s forearm, and framed with metal bracing within. Definitely stout enough to slow any intrusion of people or sound.
As for the room beyond it was shrouded in an eternal darkness, but at the distant end one could just make out a sparkling of jewels upon the floor and a dazzling wall of colored light.
The Watcher imagined that between the brilliant glitter of jewels and blinding light a dark figure knelt silently. Any certainty on exactly what lay at the far end was to never be known by the Watcher. Some places he knew well enough to stay clear of. It’s just the way it is.